...but not to me.

This is one of those books where the characters are good, the story is decent—as decent as is possible with any simple fairytale—the worldbuilding is quite interesting and it's original enough to make anew something old. Sure the writing is a bit too descriptive for my taste but that's often the case with fantasy books. The ending is engaging enough that I practically devoured the last 25% mostly because I'd become to care about the characters by then.

And yet, I'm not moved beyond three stars.

There was too much slogging through in the beginning and too many times I stopped to wonder why Frederick and Charlotte hadn't been caught yet. I just couldn't connect.

Maybe if this had been a fantasy novel with romantic elements instead of a genre romance with fantasy elements the rating would be higher.